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Initially, the Israeli air strike on the Hamas negotiating team in Qatar seemed like yet another intensification that drove the prospect of peace out of reach.

The attack on September 9 breached the territorial integrity of an US partner and risked expanding the conflict into a broader regional conflict.

Negotiations seemed to be collapsing.

Instead, it proved to be a pivotal event that has led in a agreement, declared by President Donald Trump, to free all captives still held.

That represents a goal that Trump, and Joe Biden previously, had pursued for almost 24 months.

It is just the first step towards a lasting resolution, and the details of disarming Hamas, administering Gaza and complete Israeli pullout are still to be negotiated.

But if this agreement holds, it could be Donald Trump's signature achievement of his second term - one that escaped Joe Biden and his diplomatic team.

The president's unique style and key alliances with Israel and the Middle Eastern nations appear to have contributed in this breakthrough.

However, as with most diplomatic achievements, there were also elements involved beyond the influence of either man.

A Close Relationship That Eluded Biden

Publicly, Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu are consistently friendly.

Trump likes to say that Israel has no greater ally, and the Israeli leader has called him as Israel's "greatest ever ally in the US presidency". And these warm words have been matched by actions.

During his first presidential term, the president relocated the American diplomatic mission in Israel from Tel Aviv to the contested capital and discarded a traditional American stance that Jewish communities in the occupied territories are illegal, the view under international law.

When Israel began its bombing campaign against the Islamic Republic in June, Trump directed American aircraft to strike the Iran's atomic sites with its largest non-nuclear weapons.

Those public demonstrations of support may have allowed Trump the room to apply more influence on Israel in private. According to reports, Trump's envoy, his representative, browbeat the prime minister in the latter part of the year into agreeing to a temporary ceasefire in exchange for the release of some hostages.

When Israel launched strikes against Syrian forces in July, even bombing a Christian church, the US president pressured his counterpart to change course.

The leader displayed a level of determination and pressure on an Israel's leader that is rarely seen, according to an analyst of the a think tank. "There is no example of an American president literally telling an Israeli prime minister that you're going to have to comply or else."

Biden's relationship with the Israeli administration was always more tenuous.

His administration's "bear hug approach" argued that the US had to support Israel publicly in order to enable it to moderate the nation's war conduct in private.

Underneath this was the president's nearly half-century of backing for Israel, as well as deep disagreements within his political base over the conflict in Gaza. Every step the leader took risked fracturing his own political backing, whereas his successor's loyal conservative voters gave him more flexibility to act.

In the end, domestic politics or individual ties may have had less importance than the reality that, throughout Biden's presidency, Israel was not ready to make peace.

Eight months into his new administration, with the Islamic Republic chastened, the militant group to its northern border greatly diminished and the coastal strip devastated, every one of its major strategy objectives had been achieved.

Commercial Background Assisted Secure Gulf's Backing

An Israeli strike in Doha, which killed a local national but no Hamas officials, led the president to deliver an final demand to the prime minister. The war had to end.

The US leader had given Israel a relatively free hand in Gaza. The president lent US armed support to Israeli operations in the neighboring country. But an strike on Qatar soil was a different matter entirely, pushing him towards the Arab position on how best to conclude the conflict.

A number of administration figures have told the press that this was a turning point which galvanised the leader to exert maximum pressure to get a peace deal done.

This US president's strong connections with the Gulf states are widely known. Trump has business dealings with Qatar and the UAE. The president began each of his administrations with official trips to the kingdom. This year, Trump also visited in Qatar and the UAE capital.

The president's normalization agreements, which established ties between the Jewish state and a number of Arab nations, such as the Emirates, was the most significant foreign policy success of his initial presidency.

The time devoted in the capitals of the Gulf region in recent months helped change his thinking, says an expert of the a policy institute. The US president did not visit the country on this regional tour but went to the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar where he received consistent appeals to put a stop to the conflict.

Within weeks after that attack on Doha, the president sat close as the prime minister personally phoned the Qatari leadership to express regret. And later that day, the Israeli leader gave approval on the president's comprehensive proposal for Gaza - one that also had the backing of influential Arab states in the area.

Assuming Trump's relationship with his counterpart gave him the ability to influence Israel to reach an agreement, his past with Muslim leaders may have ensured their support, and helped them persuade the group to commit to the arrangement.

"A key factor that clearly happened was that the US leader developed influence with the Israelis, and indirectly with the militants," notes Jon Alterman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

"That made a difference. The capacity to do this on his timing, and avoid yielding to the desires of the warring sides has been a challenge that lot of earlier administrations have faced, and he appears to do relatively successfully."

The reality that Trump is far better liked in Israel than the prime minister personally was leverage that he employed to his benefit, he adds.

Currently the Israeli government has agreed to releasing over a thousand Palestinians held in its jails and has agreed to a limited pullback from the strip.

The group will free all the remaining hostages, living and dead, taken in the initial October 7 Hamas attack, which caused the death of more than 1,200 Israeli citizens.

An end to the war, which has resulted in the devastation of Gaza and the fatalities of more than 67,000 {Palestinians|Pal